After working so hard to get to Alaska quickly, we took a few rest days right over the border at Deadman Lake. I came down with a really nasty cold and needed the rest, and Nic can always use a break from driving seemingly endless miles of bumpy road. And since those days earlier this week, we have slowed our pace considerably. We have to remind ourselves at times that we are in Alaska now. The Last Frontier has long been our end-game for this trip. Now that we have arrived, it’s time to get to know this place.
After leaving Deadman Lake, we arrived at the bustling town of Tok (rhymes with “poke”). A town of 1,400 feels huge when you’ve been in the middle of nowhere. We washed our piles of laundry, took care of our wastewater, and grabbed some groceries. After trying to decipher bilingual labels of unfamiliar brands during our time in Canada, it was great to see some familiar grocery choices. The best part of Tok was the cell service. We eagerly watched for a cell tower during our drive into town. We used our last few days in the USA to catch up with loved ones, and we were starting to feel so uninformed and far away. Most disappointing for me, perhaps, was reading about some improvements in a loved one’s health from his wife’s blog. I wish I had heard the good news through some other avenue. My mom would have told me if she and I had talked, but our time in Canada only gave me a few brief chances to talk to her (with terrible service). I sometimes wonder if people back home think we drove away and never looked back, that we are so consumed by what we are seeing and doing that we aren’t thinking about them anymore. While we are indeed distracted at times by our day-to-day, a big part of our thought-life and prayer-life is still with our friends and small groups in Wisconsin or with our immediate families. We wish we knew everything that was going on in their lives. Distance obviously has its difficulties.
We have continued waging war against the savage mosquito brigade. The inland Alaska we’ve seen so far has been the ideal breeding ground for mosquitoes with standing water covering the permafrost. We thought the stubby black spruce trees were sort of cute and whimsical until we learned that they thrive in swampy areas. So a forest of spruce trees means an evening of all-out mosquito war. Our screened windows are old and less than perfect, but they seem to keep the mosquitoes out. For three nights in a row, however, we woke up in the middle of the night to the high-pitch whine of a mosquito hovering around our heads. Nic jumped out of bed, turned on his headlamp, and began the hunt. He won’t stop until he’s killed some bugs, so these middle-of-the-night battles can drag on for quite some time. We can’t tell exactly how the mosquitoes are getting in, but they sure drive us crazy when they show up for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and a 2am snack.
Summer solstice sunset. Nic took the picture at 11:30pm on the solstice. The sunset stayed this way for a few hours, and the same colors remained in the sky through the middle of the night.
We found some relief from the mosquitoes in Valdez. We hadn’t originally planned to take the 117-mile (each way) detour to Valdez, since we thought it was just an oil town. The Alaska Pipeline ends in Valdez, and all that oil finds a new home on tankers there. We wanted to see some big water, though, and we thought that heading toward the coast might help with the bugs. The drive to Valdez is true Alaska, at least how we had pictured true Alaska in our minds. The highway winds through snow-topped mountains, now mostly wearing their green summer wardrobe. We stopped to see Worthington Glacier before heading over super foggy Thompson Pass, an area deemed the snowiest place in Alaska. Our guidebook says this pass is treacherous in the winter, and I believe it. With 100 monthly inches of snow typical during at least five months of the winter, I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near the hills leading to and from the pass. After driving through Keystone Canyon and past Bridal Veil Falls (probably the fourth waterfall we’ve seen on this trip with that name), we arrived at the outskirts of Valdez and heard the welcome sound of phones buzzing with service.
Worthington Glacier
Valdez sits on the shores of Prince William Sound, so you can’t see the ocean right from town. The glacier-fed sound is milky blue and appears to be surrounded by towering mountains, even in the direction of the ocean. The Chugach Mountains rise 7,000 feet from the water; they are the highest coastal mountains in Alaska. We could see evidence of the oil industry (a few big tankers at port and the oil terminal across the water), but it was easy to forget its presence. Downtown Valdez is quaint enough and offers a fairly good selection of groceries. We strolled down by the small boat harbor one evening and enjoyed seeing the enormous fish people rolled around in wheelbarrows. Commercial and sport-fishing is a staple of Valdez life, and we can see why after getting a glimpse of what they pull out of the water! Nic tried out the free community shooting range, and I went for a great bike ride along a scenic paved path by the water. We printed a document at the local library and sent off some important mail. We stayed for three nights in our quiet enough campground and enjoyed the chance to relax. We took full advantage of scalding showers each night.
We left Valdez earlier today and are on our way towards Anchorage. It will feel very strange to be in a town of 300,000, but we’re looking forward to the amenities in the area. We’re overdue for another oil change (after only a month!) and could use some reasonably priced provisioning. Let’s hope the mosquitoes aren’t too bad.
My beautiful bike ride in Valdez.
Are you having fun with me today? 